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Greece witnesses 24-hour strike over state TV closure
Greece is witnessing a nationwide general strike in protest at the government's surprise decision to shut down state broadcaster ERT.
Trade unions and all media are participating in the 24-hour work stoppage, which began at midnight on Thursday (2100 GMT Wednesday), and protests are planned later in the day.
The strike comes after the broadcaster's television and radio stations were abruptly taken off air late on June 11. The move, which is part of the Greek government's unpopular austerity measures, left ERT’s nearly 2,700 staff suspended.
Thousands of people gathered outside ERT headquarters in Athens to protest against Athens’ move to close the media outlet.
ERT journalists also refused to leave the broadcaster's headquarters and continued their programs live on the Internet into Wednesday.
However, Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras defended the government’s decision on June 12, saying, “We are eliminating a hotbed of opacity and waste. We are protecting the public interest.”
Meanwhile, Greece’s leading union GSEE said in a statement that the lockup of ERT “amounts to a coup d’état.”
Greek Parliament should ratify the executive order to close ERT within three months. However, the order cannot be approved without support from the minority coalition lawmakers.
Alexis Tsipras, the leader of the main opposition party, SYRIZA, has condemned the shutdown as “illegal” in an interview on ERT online broadcast.
“Many times the word 'coup' is used as an exaggeration. In this case, it is not an exaggeration,” he said.
The shutdown of ERT has created the semblance “of a political and institutional crisis,” Socialist leader Evangelos Venizelos also said.
ERT began broadcasting in 1938, running three domestic TV channels, four national radio stations as well as regional radio stations and an external service, Voice of Greece.
MR/NN - See more at: http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2013/06/13/308747/greece-faces-strike-over-ert-closure/#sthash.SvvZAb5C.dpuf
Source of picture and article:
Press TV News
Euronews Video from yesterday, June 12th.
1 comment:
If the Greek government did an Enron with its own books, and Greeks Trojan Horse their Greek taxes, what makes you think they pay the IRS? They go to Greece annually to tend their undisclosed accounts on soviet Cyprus. Notice the soviet spy money laundered Metsos disappeared with Cyprus complicity? The Turks would not let him escape because they don’t share the soviet religion. That is why Cyprus must remain divided! Did Illinois Giannoulias, Florida's Crist, California's Angelides and New York's Gianaris apply Greek budgeting techniques like Sarbanes Oxen? Greek Ponzi fourfold Eurodefecit boasts Trojan Horse Perfidy, Klephth Brigandage. Upset that industrious Albanians invaded their lazy, gungrabbing, babykilling homeland, the soviet-churched Greeks vindictively hire, house and promote illegals. As quakes render their homes disposable, Greeks are oblivious to the very concept of maintenance. Instead of blaming environmetalists for fires and socialists for deficits, jealousy driven soviet faith seeks scapegoats. Olympia Snowjob supports Obamacare and abortion because of her gangreen patriarch (Is Orthodox Christianity progressive? Michelle Boorstein Washington Post 11-4-09 Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew spoke about the spiritual imperative for nonviolence, universal health care and reducing consumption to help the environment.) Ancient Greeks reduced consumption to help the environment through infanticide and sodomy. Palamite Zealotes massacred Thessalonian aristocracy in preparation for Cantacuzene usurpation via hesychast hyperventilatory hallutination. This soviet socialism motivated Anatolian farmers to embrace Turks in the 1400s to avoid redistributative taxation and then for liberated mainlanders to migrate to Smyrna in the 1800s. Ain't gonna vote for Do Kaka Goat! Avenge Jake, Hang Bart!
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